


Relevé

by spacehopper



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Arranged Marriage, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-31
Updated: 2018-03-31
Packaged: 2019-04-07 09:04:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,037
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14077497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spacehopper/pseuds/spacehopper
Summary: "Can you dance, Prince Noctis?"





	Relevé

**Author's Note:**

  * For [shadow_lover](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadow_lover/gifts).



“Can you dance, Prince Noctis?”

He sees the wary look in the boy’s eyes. No, not a boy anymore. But still guarded. Wary. Like he was when he first came to Tenebrae all those years ago. Ravus isn’t who the prince wants, and he feels much the same. But this is how things are, how they have to be. 

For now.

He offers Noctis a hand, and to his surprise, Noctis takes it, meeting his eyes with a challenging stare. Such a deep, eerie blue, framed by dark lashes and pale skin. Ravus reached forward with his free hand, brushes a stray lock of hair out of his face. Noctis starts, and Ravus draws back. He’s overstepped.

“Shall we begin?”

Noctis nods, jaw clenched and muscles stiff as Ravus tugs him into position. As they stand there, staring at each other, Noctis looks like he’d rather be anywhere but here. Ravus feels much the same, and yet. 

“I’ll lead.” 

Flesh turns to iron in his grip as Noctis meets his eyes with a glare. “Why do you get to lead?”

Ravus bites back his initial retort, to say that he will lead because he is not a petulant child, resisting an impossible force that is better joined than conquered. He takes a breath. Steadies himself. Loosens his grip on Noctis’s waist, because this is not a contest of foes, but the forging of a tentative alliance. 

“I believe I have more skill in this arena. Am I correct?” The last he throws out as a bone to Noctis. He knows that he is. 

Lips tighten, eyes narrow. But again, the prince nods. He forgot to put music on, but no matter. The steps are simple, familiar. 

And for a moment, it works. Noctis seems to relax, and lets Ravus guide him. Still stiff, and awkward, but perhaps there’s something to be made of him underneath that.

Then he stumbles.

“What’s the point?” he says, pulling away in frustration, his back now to kRavus. He stifles his initial impulse to snap. Be kind, and patient. He almost snorts at the thought, so contrary to his nature. But it’s what Luna wanted. 

“We will be expected to dance at the wedding.” His hand hovers over Noctis’s shoulder. 

“For the Nifs?” He turns, and Ravus’s hand drops to his side. “I don’t care.”

“It is important to observe protocol—”

“Why? Why play their game? You’re a prisoner just as much as I am.” Noctis gives him a faintly disgusted look. “Or maybe not.”

Noctis strides towards the door, and Ravus can’t bit back one final remark.

“You impetuous child—” 

The door slams in his face, and he curses the silence that follows.

*

In battle, Noctis moves like water, fury and tranquility intermingled as he spins and dodges around the room. He flings out his sword, vanishing in a flash of blue only to reappear on the other side of the room. The power of kings. Ravus’s hands clench into fists. Before he even realizes what he’s doing, he draws his sword and steps into the center of the room. 

A small, arrogant smile appears on Noctis’s face. Confident, cocky even. Ravus has never had a chance to pit himself against the power of the Lucian kings. 

He raises his sword. And Noctis is gone. 

A shift of cloth, the slice of a blade through the air, and Ravus dodges, far less elegantly than he hoped, as Noctis slashes at him from behind. Ravus spins, too late to meet him as he dances away. His face is blank again, and Ravus is only able to read his next move from the way his eyes dart to the side. 

When the strike comes this time, he counters, their blades locking with a clang. Sweat runs down Noctis’s face, and Ravus wonders how long he’d been training before Ravus had interrupted him. He opens his mouth to ask, but before he can Noctis pivots and vanishes in a flash of blue. This time he expects the attack, and whirls in time to force the blade from Noctis’s hand. It clatters to the floor. Noctis’s eyes follow it, teeth clenched in rage, or pain. 

Ravus sheaths his sword. 

“You fight well.” Fresh, the fight would have lasted longer. And someday, Ravus knows, Noctis will be able to destroy him. But not today. “That same grace can be used to dance.” 

The hand he offers is met with suspicion.

“Why do we have to do this?” he says. “I mean, do the Nifs really care if I can dance?” His bitterness is clear, and Ravus can hardly blame him. But there is a lesson he must learn, if he is to survive. 

Ravus wraps his fingers around the bare skin of Noctis’s arm, and yanks him to his feet. He yelps in surprise, stumbles. Ravus catches him, holds him firmly in place. 

“The Nifs care about weakness. And a failure to adhere to protocol will be seen as one.” He tugs Noctis’s arms into the right position, but he remains stiff, rigid. Unyielding. 

Good.

“Why do you care?” His eyes are burning, though with what, Ravus doesn’t know. Something not quite rage, and not quite hope. 

He hesitates a moment, hand gripping the fabric at Noctis’s waist.

“Before she disappeared, my sister asked one thing of me. ‘Protect him.’ And I will honor her wish.” He looks past Noctis while he says this. Can’t quite meet his eyes. He still remembers what Luna looked like when she said it, that small, sad smile. She’d already known she was leaving. He had too. He just hadn’t wanted to accept it. Still doesn’t, in his darker moments.

Noctis nods, and Ravus doesn’t add his other reason. That in the weeks since Noctis had come to Tenebrae, he’d stopped blaming him for his father’s sins. Noctis is just another pawn.

But someday, he might be a king. 

*

One day, many weeks later, he finds Noctis is the sylleblossom fields, staring off into the distance. Ravus lingers for a moment, watching his still form. Is he thinking about his time here as a child? His own home, lost to him now? Or perhaps their impending wedding.

He approaches then, quietly, but from the way Noctis’s fingers curl, Ravus knows he heard. He puts a gentle hand on Noctis’s shoulder, and says, “We leave for Gralea tomorrow.”

Noctis doesn’t answer, but doesn’t pull away from him either. On impulse, he leans down to pluck a flower, and offers it to Noctis. 

“An unusually dark blue.” Noctis’s fingers brush his own. “Like your eyes.” He curses himself as soon as the words leave his mouth, saccharine and dripping with sincerity. They are allies in a war, not foolish young lovers. They have no time for this. 

Noctis’s touch lingers, and a wind rushes through the field, ruffling his hair. Then he takes the flower from Ravus’s hand. As if a spell was broken, his eyes suddenly widen, and he stumbles back.

“I have to, uh, go pack.” He turns from Ravus, flees, and Ravus curses himself again.

When had he begun to care?

*

In Gralea they are locked into ornate velvet cells that the Emperor calls guest rooms. But guests are free to take their leave. And guests are allowed to talk.

Simpering courtiers tell him it would be ever so improper, for him and his betrothed to interact overmuch before the wedding. He bites back a retort that they were in Tenebrae for weeks before coming here, that there has been plenty of chance to be improper. He ignores the way the thought makes him flush, and remember Noctis’s twilight blue eyes. 

He sees Noctis rarely, but hears of him more. Some courtiers compliment him on such a handsome catch. Others take a more salacious turn, lips lingering suggestively on their forks, and it’s all Ravus can do not to slam their faces into the table.

But he contains himself. He must. 

Until a particularly obnoxious man laughs and places an overly familiar hand on his shoulder.

“Your betrothed is quite fierce.” His breath stinks of alcohol, and Ravus remembers his name. Alekos. A fool who thinks they are friends. “Like a kitten, slashing with tiny claws.” A mad, barking laugh leaves his throat, and it’s all Ravus can do not to throw him across the room.

“I did not realize you’d had cause to meet Prince Noctis,” he says, mustering a semblance of civility. 

“Oh, I met him.” He leans in closer, and Ravus cannot help but shy away, so rancid is the smell of sweat. “Pretty little thing. You’re lucky, Lord Ravus.” 

Someday, Ravus will run this man through with his sword, and he will enjoy every moment. But today, he contents himself with a pointed remark.

“Kittens rarely remain so.” He gives Alekos a gentle shove, and makes sure he feels the prick of his knife against his side. His eyes widen, and he turns to storm off.

Noctis is there. His hand flashes blue, and a dagger appears, wicked sharp. Alekos’s lips curl, but he is a coward. He flees.

And there is nothing in the space between them.

Ravus’s mouth is suddenly dry, because Noctis is smiling at him. He’s never seen him smile like that before, not cocky, or arrogant. But almost sweet. He meets Ravus’s eyes, and the expression vanishes, and in a flash, he vanishes along with it.

Ravus curses his hesitation, and returns to the wretched party. There is little else he can do.

*

It continues on like this, barely contained rage vented through training sessions, hacking MTs apart while blank faced scientists take notes, improvements so they could take more lands like they’d taken Tenebrae. Until one day a wide-eyed serving girl slips him a crumpled note written in a messy hand. On the note is a place and a time. Tonight, in a rarely used wing of the palace. It isn’t signed, but he knows that hand, from the one letter he’d received before they’d met again.

He stalks the dark halls that night, wary for any sign of trouble, another lying courtier to tell him to go back to his room, that he’d have his fun on his wedding night. He imagines running them through sometimes, taking their blood like they took his mother’s, and saying that he’d have his fun now.

But no. He’s learned patience, these years of captivity. 

The door to the room creaks open, and Noctis’s head jerks up, half-lit by moonlight, the other half still in shadow. Ravus holds out a hand, and Noctis hesitates.

He frowns. “It was you who sent the note?”

“Yeah.” But he remains hidden in the shadows. 

Ravus strides across the room, tugs Noctis to his feet, into the moonlight. A dark bruise colors his cheek, just below his eye, and something hot bubbles in his chest. 

“Who did this?” The words are clipped, angry. 

“Someone who won’t be doing it again.” His smile is bitter but triumphant, and Ravus smiles in return. He doesn’t ask what Noctis did. Whoever harmed him deserved their fate. He hopes it was Alekos. 

“Why did you call me here?” One hand is on Noctis’s waist, the other now dropped to his neck. 

“I still need to learn to dance.” 

He’d improved greatly, in their weeks in Tenebrae. Ravus thinks there is little left for him to learn. So instead of changing their position, he asks Noctis a question.

“Don’t you believe this meeting is improper?” 

Noctis’s eyes dance as he leans in. “Think we could make them mad?”

“Oh, certainly.” It would have been unimaginable once, what he now intends to do. His nose brushes Noctis’s cheek, just below the bruise. Then he tilts his head up, presses his lips against it. Noctis gasps lightly, but doesn’t pull away. 

“May I kiss you, Prince Noctis?” He is courteous. Courtly even. His mother would be shocked. Luna would be proud. 

Fingers weave their way through his hair, and his head is tugged down, lips meeting Noctis’s in a clumsy rush. Always impulsive, burning hot and cold and beautiful.

He kisses Noctis in that darkened room, and thinks that soon, they will rise.


End file.
